


A Wolf At Your Door

by CaesarVulpes



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Faerie AU, Gen, Holy shit slow burn, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Misgendering, Nonbinary Character, Other, Past Rape/Non-con, Slow Burn, extremely self-indulgent fae au, graphic descriptions of what magical Fear Toxin does to people, not sure if shipping but probably shipping, or makes them do to themselves, sort of???, the violence/misgendering/sexual assault is NOT between members of the ship, trans Edward, what am gender
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2018-09-19 18:45:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9455594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaesarVulpes/pseuds/CaesarVulpes
Summary: He swears he can feel the faintest touch of claws beneath his chin. He shivers.“What is it you desire,” it continues, trailing its fingers this time down the back of his neck, “What hurts can the Scarecrow soothe?”Eddie Nigma wants revenge so badly he's willing to make a deal with a very dangerous Faerie.





	1. Chapter 1

It’s not hard to find the Faerie’s lair. The hardest part is finding the abandoned coast town, reclaimed by the surrounding forest and sea, its name lost to time.  The air feels thin, the ground too solid, the buildings a little too enticing. This place longs to have a purpose again, it yearns to be full.

Local legends are very clear, for once. There is no single place, no convenient cave or crossroads. The only way to find it is to get lost. Even for someone with Eddie’s memory it’s easy, maybe too easy. He’s only there for half an hour before he finds the alley. A space between dilapidated buildings and twisted trees, impossibly dark and cloaked in the pervasive salted fog that covers this ruined place.

The place he ends up in is far bigger than an alleyway. His steps echo in the suffocating darkness, his little lantern barely lighting his own feet.

(It had to be a candle. Faeries seem to appreciate the classics, and with this one he’ll need all the help he can get.)

The faerie’s voice is soft, but so much rougher than he would have thought. Like gravel, like little chips of glass.

“ _What ails you, sweet little thing?_ ”

He swears he can feel the faintest touch of claws beneath his chin. He shivers.

“ _What is it you desire,_ ” it continues, trailing its fingers this time down the back of his neck, “ _What hurts can the Scarecrow soothe?_ ”

 _Scarecrow_. That’s what they call it in hushed whispers, in the bars where grizzled old men whisper about such things, about sirens and selkies and the terror in the darkness.

“I heard you were the one to come to about curses.”

A laugh, low and cold, ringing in the darkness from all sides.

“ _Oh soft, sweet little fool,_ ” it says, “ _My prices are high_.”

He squares his shoulders, draws himself up to his full height.

“I’m aware.” Eddie clenches his fists. “I want to punish someone. Several someones. I want to make them suffer.”

“ _Why?_ ”

The word holds such implications. It resonates with the understanding that his answer had better be both truthful and interesting.

“Because they did it to me.”

There’s a noise suspiciously like a scoff.

“ _Justice doesn’t interest me, boy_.”

“It’s not justice, it’s _revenge_.”

The Faerie steps into the light. Or rather it congeals out of shadows, impossibly tall and thin. Two pairs of massive, jet black wings surround him, a crooked mouth smiles at him with far too many teeth, two pairs of eyes gleam eerily pale from under its shaggy hair.

“ _ **That** , I can arrange._”

The Faerie produces a set of shining orange orbs, spinning them this way and that, dancing them over its long fingers. It’s hard to tear his eyes from it.

“ _This will strike fear into their hearts. Damage that cannot be undone, perhaps even lethal given your intent._ ”

He swallows hard. “What are your terms?”

“ _Only that I be allowed to observe. I find it quite entertaining_.” Its shadows curl around Eddie and he can almost feel them on his skin. Its feathers brush his shoulder.

“ _And_ ,” it says, its low voice nearly a purr, “ _That I may watch **you** suffer the effects as well._ ”

“When?”

“ _At my discretion_.”

Eddie shakes his head.

“No. _When_ , exactly, and how long, or you’ll have none of your fun.”

It lets out another low rustle of laughter, slow and sweeping like the turning of leaves.

“ _Very well, clever little thing. Let’s say…_ ” It taps its chin thoughtfully with blackened, clawed fingers. “ _The full moon. I will come for you then, at its rise, and you will give me three days to do as I wish._ ”

“Deal.”

For the first time, the Faerie looks surprised. Pleased, but surprised.

 _“Are you certain, little one? Perhaps you are under the delusion that I shall be kind to you. Your people have such charming tales of Faerie folk dancing you to death._ ” It draws a claw along Eddie’s jaw. “ _You will long for something whimsical as that_.”

“Dancing?”

“ _Death._ ”

It ought to scare him. He knows it ought to frighten him into seeing sense, but at this point he's so far beyond _sense_.

“Why are you telling me this? I thought your kind loved to warp the truth. I thought you lived to get us wrapped up in terms we knew nothing of.”

The Faerie rolls its many eyes. “ _I prefer informed dread. I find it so much more fulfilling._ ”

Eddie nods once, extending a hand.

“I accept your terms. I’ve already lived all my nightmares.”

The Faerie’s grin returns, impossibly wide with far too many teeth. A long, twisted hand takes his, and oh, it’s impossibly cold.

“ _We shall see_.”


	2. Chapter 2

Eddie wakes up flat on his back at the center of the abandoned town. His broken lantern lies beside him, four blackened holes through the side. What an asshole.

He kicks himself when he realizes he didn’t tell it how many he needs, but when he reaches into his coat pocket he finds three. Three perfect, softly glowing spheres.

One for his father, one for his former employer. One for the men whose names he doesn’t know but whose worthless faces are branded into his mind.

They feel like glass, thinner even, like bubbles almost. He’s almost afraid they’ll break in his pocket but somehow he knows they won’t. They know their purpose and won’t shatter a moment before.

It’s a two hour drive back to the city. He tries to listen to the radio, tries counting, tries to think about anything but the two weeks he has to enact his vengeance before the moon is full. The orbs feel heavy in his pockets, they feel hot and alive in some sick, feverish way. They want to be used.

Two weeks is so little time. He’ll have to rush his plans, but getting caught seems like less of a problem now. Who will ever believe he used _magic_ to punish them? And in any case he’ll be long gone before any investigation there may be goes anywhere.

He thinks he should maybe be more scared of the Faerie’s intentions. What a way to die. Whisked away by faeries in exchange for a curse. It seems fitting that he should just drop out of the world.

When he gets home he finds a black feather on the mat in front of his apartment door. He doesn’t want to touch it, he’s afraid it will stain his hands and he doesn’t know why. He leaves it there.

 

Eddie could have gone his whole life without setting foot in this stupid bar ever again. ~~~~

“Hey, Ed! How’s your sister?”

A handful of people think they went to high school with his sister.

“She’s alright,” he says, forces a smile and doesn’t meet the woman’s eye.

_Idiot, fool, simpleton. The signs are all there, if you wanted to see them, but you don’t._

She doesn’t need to see the scars on his chest, she doesn’t need to see the scars in his mind. Let them think it. It’s safer.

He slips into the dingy office in the back, wrinkling his nose at the reek of stale cigarettes.

Abrams has the nerve to smile at him. As though he wasn’t all too happy to leave him out in the cold.

“Eddie. Wondered when you’d be back.”

“Did you now.” He keeps a hand on the door handle behind him.

“I assume you want your old spot back? I’m sure we can work something out.”

“You didn’t want to work something out when I told you not to schedule me when they were here _,”_ he says. “You didn’t want to work something out when I told you how handsy they were getting.”

He rolls his eyes.

“You’re not still mad, are you?”

“Of course I am.” _I’ll be angry when the sun burns out._ _I’ll be angry when you’re dead and I’m dead_.

He'll be angry when the last proton gives up its charge and lets the last atom rip apart. When the holes left by dead stars swallow each other and universe heaves its heat death, he will still be angry. _  
_

Abrams scoffs, throws up his hands.

“Eddie, don’t be like that. I have a business to run. These things happen.”

“They really don’t,” he says, and lets the little ball fall from his fingers. It shatters when it hits the floor, the orange mist within streaming towards Abrams.

He doesn’t watch the effects on his former boss but he listens at the door, listens to the screams and the incoherent pleas and the sick, ringing silence afterward. He doesn’t go in. He’s almost indifferent to his suffering—after all, his sins have been of inaction.  It’s still good to know it works. His chest already feels a little lighter as he slips out the back before the staff can investigate. So light, in fact, that he almost misses the raven sitting in the window, looking intently inside at the aftermath. It turns to him and he shudders.

Ravens don’t have that many eyes.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter with the graphic violence and the misgendering, please be advised.

Eddie dreams he’s floating on the surface of a black lake. The distant shores are snowy. He can see the flakes falling from the gray sky but none fall around him. After a moment he lets himself sink into the water, lets it swallow his arms and his legs and gather up his hair, but it doesn’t fill up his nose like it should. Instead he breathes, deep and slow, and lets himself drift to the bottom.

Except that he feels his back break the surface of water, and he suddenly has the impression of lying face down. A bird lands on his back but he stays, floating calmly and breathing deep the smell of snow and smoke.

“ _Most of your kind struggle too much,_ ” the bird says. He doesn’t have to look to know it’s the raven.

“I’m not afraid,” he says.

“ _You only have to turn around, child.”_

“I’m fine here.”

“ _You will drown.”_

“I’m not afraid.”

He wakes at his first lungful of cold water.

 

They’re woefully easy to trap. It’s almost pathetic how the very sight of him draws them out of the bar and into the back room, out the back door into the alley. The same alley. _The_ alley.

“Knew you liked it,” one of them says, the One Who Laughed. Stringy, with an oily sheen to his voice. “Didn’t I say, didn’t I tell you she’d be back for more.”

Eddie still feels the sting of _she_. It still strikes him like an arrow but instead of falling back he lets it pass through him. It hurts, but pain is only temporary.

The One Who Bit Him pushes himself off the alley wall, grips his shoulder. “You still trying to be a man, baby?”

“Are _you_?” He asks.

The Instigator laughs. He starts to crowd in, opens his mouth and Eddie drops the second orb. He’d rather never hear another word again than hear whatever this creature has to say. Orange mist rushes forth, streaks into their mouths, their noses, their eyes.

Eddie watches them rip themselves apart in the back alley where they did it to him. The One Who Laughed chokes on his own hysterical babbling and bites through his tongue. The One Who Bit Him tears his own face to shreds, claws his eyes from their sockets. The tall one, the instigator, the ringleader, simply screams until his voice is a hoarse whistle, a wheeze that brings forth more blood than sound.

Eddie was afraid he’d feel nothing. Instead he feels too much, feels sick from the smell and the gore. Even the very sight of them, the sound of their voices, makes his skin crawl again.

He hoped he’d feel different but as he gets into his car he feels the same, sick and gross and frightened. He drives into a parking complex, drives to the very top and sits there and screams until his throat hurts and his ears are ringing and he can’t see for the angry tears. He stays and screams and cries and slams on the wheel and the dashboard and the car is much too small to hold him. He feels like a tornado of emotions no one has names for, he slams the car door so hard the crack in his window gets just a little bigger.

He kicks at the door, the ground, throws rocks at the other cars and still he aches. The harsh wind swallows his rage, gathers it up and blows it away and soon it’s dusk and all that’s left is a horrible, crushing weight that forces him to his knees. He cries hot, ugly tears, snivels and wipes his snotty nose on his sleeve like a little boy, and when there are no tears left he goes home. He has a task to finish. The last orb pulses in his pocket, he has to finish this.

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

His two weeks have congealed into two days, and still the little sphere sits on his dresser, glowing smugly among his keys. The rest of his apartment is wreckage, what little cheap furniture he has smashed and twisted, everything heavy enough to throw has been thrown. Most of it he did after the last confrontation. The old urges came back in full force and just like before, destroying things besides himself doesn’t satisfy the wolves in his nerves. He wants to peel his skin off, to become something no hands have ever touched. Instead he smashes three holes in his bedroom walls and breaks every kitchen cabinet with a hammer and shatters his mirror. Fuck his landlord, he’ll be as good as dead soon anyway. He’ll leave this place as dust and ashes if he wants.

He’s had two whole weeks and he still can’t even look at the old house without getting sick. He’s thought about mailing it to his old man, but if he doesn’t see it for himself he’ll never believe he’s really dead.

On the other hand, if he actually _sees_ his father he’ll probably lose his nerve. Possibly throw up.

 _I can’t do this._ The deadly fall from his window suddenly looks enticing. _I can’t do this, I’m too weak._

“I can’t do this,” he tells the orb. He squeezes it tight, tries to crush it between his hands but it holds fast. It was not intended for him. He screams his frustration, and it does not shatter when it hits the wall.

 

He doesn’t sink into the lake this time. He floats, perfectly still, watching the snow fall from the gray sky, collecting on the bank and disappearing through the black water around him. It doesn’t land on the lake, it continues to fall through down to what Eddie assumes is the other side. The raven lands on his chest, peering curiously at him with eerie eyes.

“ _Most don’t like to linger here.”_

“It’s peaceful,” he says.

“ _Do you feel powerless, here?”_

 “No,” he says.

The raven tilts its head.

“ _Aren’t you afraid to sink, Child?”_

“I could sink if I wanted to. I could drown if I wanted to.”

“ _Little one,”_ the raven says, “ _If you wished, you could fly.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the short chapter! I still need to figure out exactly what I intend to do here. Harley is in the next chapter, I promise!


	5. Chapter 5

He wakes sore and bruised, exposed. He feels naked, he feels eyes most places and where there are no eyes there is a gaping isolation. Showering doesn’t help. The water isn’t hot enough. There’s a raw, hollow pit inside him and he’s so used to it by now that it takes a while to realize he’s actually hungry. The cabinets are empty, he knows, what little food he had was eaten up days ago.

He actually manages to put his shoes on without slamming the steel toe down on his hand until it is twisted like a spider. It’s tempting but ultimately far too much work.

His keys are harder, each edge is an invitation, each rough angle a promise. He rubs his thumb against a worn bit of his car key until the skin is raw and throbbing, but no more than that.

The black feather has melted into his doormat. He feels marked and it makes his skin crawl. He slams the door, does not leave his apartment. The thought of seeing another person makes him feel like his bones are twisting under his skin.

Time doesn’t seem to work anymore. He lies down on his rickety little couch for what seems like days. The water-stained ceiling becomes a screen and he lies for decades watching it. He forgets that it doesn’t move after a while of snapping from one uncomfortable constellation to the next. It all seems so fluid. Here a gaping mouth, there a twisted sword and now the mouth is a cloud of locusts. Charming. For a moment he thinks he sees the black lake, but he blinks and can’t find it again.

Something taps his window. Soft, at first, then more insistent. Steady.

He starts by curling his toes. It’s easiest to start small. If he tries to move all at once he’ll go nowhere. After that he manages to shift his feet, then his legs, then eventually sit up and squint at the dirty window. There’s something out there all right, zooming this way and that and tapping like a jackhammer against the glass.

Curiosity always was a great motivator. He wonders morbidly if it’s some kind of demon. Demons and faeries are close enough, right? The window sheds a layer of cheap paint flakes as he pries it up. Cold wind streams in and buffets the little creature about, almost smacking it into the sill.

It’s a red hummingbird with a black diamond on its chest. Golden talons, crystal blue eyes. As it flits closer he can see that its wings are iridescent like beetle wings. It lands and shakes itself, and the wings fold up into its back and disappear under sparkling elytra.

It’s honestly pretty cute, watching it hop around his demolished couch.

 “ _I thought you might be dead, honey. The leaves said ya haven’t left in days.”_

The words emerge into all his senses at once. He smells the cool wind of her flight. He hears her voice ring in his ears like a bell and sees it shimmer over her feathers. It’s dizzying.

“The leaves.”

She lifts off again, flitting this way and that.

“ _The ones that blew against your window, dummy.”_

His mouth is dry now, and his stomach feels like it’s trying to escape his body. With each passing second it’s getting harder to tell which is weirder, a talking hummingbird or her thick regional accent. New Jersey maybe?

“You’re, uh. You’re one of _them?_ ”

Her tittering laughter tingles in his ears as she does a cheery little loop in the air in front of him.

“ _What gave it away?”_ She does a little roll and flits around him. “ _You can say Faerie, ya know. It’s not a bad word. ”_

“People don’t talk about your kind anymore. Hard to tell what to do.”

She giggles some more.

_“It’s fine. I’m not like other Faeries, I’m a cool Faerie.”_ She does another flip as if to demonstrate. “ _See? Totally chill.”_

“Why are you here?”

She touches down ever so gently on his endtable. She pokes her beak at the final, mocking orange sphere nestled ever so innocuously among pocket change and old receipts.

“ _For this._ ”

His heart sinks. His hands shake and he clenches them into fists.

“I have another day. The full moon is tomorrow night.” He wills his voice not to shake, and plants his feet. He’ll be bewitched, kidnapped, probably killed, but he will _not_ be _cheated_.

“I have until tomorrow. That was the deal.”

She lifts off again, zooming straight towards him this time. He could swear she was smaller when she last landed.

“ _Calm down. I’m here to help you.”_

It would be so easy to snatch her out of the air right now. He could do it, and dash her beautiful little head against the wall.

“ _I promise I won’t hurt you. They gave you their word and they intend to keep it.”_

Her sincerity burns in the back of his throat and behind his eyes.

“ _I **swear**. Don’t you know what that means for us? Words are what we are, honey, even you. Deeper than blood, we’re words. I won’t waste ‘em makin’ empty promises.”_

His eyes might be burning on their own.

“Why would you ever want to help me?”

“ _Because I think you’re pretty,”_ she says, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, “ _I like your orange eyelashes and your sad eyes.”_  

He laughs, forced and heavy in his throat.

“I suppose that’s as good a reason as any.”

He’s so tired. He’s so fucking tired.

“ _Hold out your hands._ ”

He does so and she flits over to land safely in his cupped hands. Her tiny talons almost tickle against his palms.

“ _You can smush me if ya don’t feel safe. Right here. Poof!”_ She accentuates the last word with a little hop. “ _Piñata! Confetti everywhere! Candy for everybody!”_

Despite himself he smiles, just a bit.

“ _There ya go. I wanna help you. Let me take the last Curse, I know you’re not gonna use it.”_

“I can’t. I—I have to. I _have_ to do this.”

“ _Honey, no, you can—_ ”

His fingers curl in, desperate to be a fist, but he stops short, afraid to crush her tiny body.

“You think it—They, you think _they_ won’t be mad if I drop my end of the deal?”

“ _They don’t have to know. Nobody has to know but us.”_

“I _have_ to. He deserves to die, he—he has to pay for what he’s done.”

Her tiny claws dig into his palms.

“ _This is poisoning you, it’s eating you alive and even the roaches know why.”_

“I’m not weak. I can do this.”

“ _I don’t think you can, sweetie, and you don’t have to. I promise you don’t have to.”_

His knees feel one step from collapsing, he wants to pace, to storm out but if he moves he’ll upset this tenuous balance and tear himself to shreds. Knowing his father is alive somewhere but not knowing exactly where, knowing he could show up any day and say the old words, the old name that feels like a mouth full of oil, is _agony._ It’s terror. It’s a fear that lives and breathes, it’s a fear with strong, rough hands and the map of his every scar to open and peruse, to twist and pinch and pull until it finds the right thread to unravel him.

Eddie’s mouth trembles. His eyes sting.

“I can’t live like this anymore. I’ll die. I can’t go back to being powerless.”

“ _Bring me closer?”_

He does, lifting her gently up to his face. Her golden beak takes on a strange, sickly sheen as it reflects his pale skin.

“ _I don’t know you, sweetie,”_ she says. “ _But I know you’re hurting.”_

She leans her tiny forehead against his, her silky feathers caressing his skin. His hands shake but he doesn’t let go of her. He hates the tightness in his throat and he hates the hot tears streaming down past his chin and wetting his shirt.

“ _Say the word and I’ll take it away_. _You’ll never have to look at it again. I’ll give you something else instead, something heavy and warm to protect you. You only have to ask.”_

_When has asking for help ever got me any?_

If he can’t do this then what good is he?

_But I **can’t.**_

“Please,” he says. “Please. Take it.”

His legs are shaking.

She lifts off and does a little flip.

“ _I’m on it!”_

She zooms away to the orb—Curse?—and picks it up with an ease that should be impossible for such a little thing.

_“Don’t cry, dummy. It’s all gonna be fine, you’ll see.”_

“That’s a nice thought,” he says, sniffling. “It really is.”

The emotional shift makes him dizzy.

“ _Get something to cover it up—something big.”_ She pecks playfully at his cheek, rubs her soft little head against his flushed face. “ _Go on, dummy.”_

He’s in the blurry, heady no-man’s-land between anguish and joy, not done feeling one but so ready to escape to the other. He wipes at his face.

“Keep your feathers on.”

He fishes around for something that isn’t broken, eventually finding a big flowerpot stolen from some unwary neighbor years ago.

“How’s this?”

“ _It’s fine, just put it over me and don’t look right at it. Your mind might melt a little bit.”_

“What?”

She lands on his upended coffee table and cocks her head to the side.

“ _Summoning is pretty weird on the human brain as it is, but sending and calling at the same time is…”_

She hops a little in place. “ _Imagine an atom splitting. Got it?”_

He nods. “Yeah?”

_“It’s nothing like that.”_

“Not encouraging.”

But he’s already dropping it over her and the Curse and stepping back. Glass and stray screws crunch under his boots. He turns and looks at the far wall and the deep, ragged hole in the drywall.

Brilliant red light fills his apartment. It seems to fill his nose, his mouth, seems to crackle in his ears and shine through his skin. All the hair on his arms stands up and his neck crawls. The air sparkles as motes of dust catch fire.

And then it fades, and the sizzling subsides and his ears pop.

And there’s a little red hummingbird sitting on a large, soft gray rock, about the size of both of his fists together.

“ _Come touch it, sweetie.”_

He hesitates to come close, afraid that this is all a trick. But when he touches it it’s so warm, a warmth that travels up the bones of his hand and into his whole body. It’s smooth, and heavy too, almost too heavy for its size. It’s…

“Perfect,” he manages. “It’s perfect.”

_“I know._ ”

And he’s alone with the ringing of her voice still in his ears. His knees finally give and he falls against the tattered remains of his couch. The stone seems to almost pulse in response, warmth radiating through his tense shoulders and aching hands.

He lies there, clutching the stone like a teddy bear until the weak sun is replaced with the coral-orange of sodium lights, the light poured warm into his windows and the shadows smeared cool blue across the floor.

 

He’s on his back again, the lake still as ever. There’s a rustling in the trees as though a gust of wind has upset them but all he feels is cool, still air. The occasional snowflake drifts past his eyes, each icy fractal exact and perfect. He doesn’t turn his head to look, but he wonders whether, if he could drift up with them and look down, the lake would be a perfect circle.

_If it isn’t,_ he thinks, _it should be._

A black feather floats down from somewhere far above and lands on his chest. It shouldn’t be heavy, and it’s not, but the impact makes his chest dip below the surface just a bit, and for the first time a thick ripple goes out across the water.

And all around him, every snowflake stops.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoo boy this took a while huh? Hope it was worth it! It makes me smile every day to know that you guys liked it so far, and it may take some time but I intend to see this through. Thanks everybody for your kudos and comments! (and also I'm sorry if you came to see anyone be at all in character)


	6. Chapter 6

Dawn of the final day.

Dread still sits heavy in Eddie’s chest but he’s calm now. Resigned. The stone helps a little, tucked into the pouch of his sweatshirt. A warm, comforting weight against his belly.

What does a man with nothing left do with his last day?

A cruel, unsatisfying riddle.

First he paints. He’s always wanted his house to be green, and while this old paint is starting to separate and settle into chunks, it sticks to the walls. He won’t be around to answer to his landlord. He can do what he damn well pleases and it does, in a way, bring him comfort to imagine the stupid bastard having to clean up after him.

In the end, he reads. He hacks into his neighbor’s wifi network and reads everything he can find about Fae. Myths, legends, things that used to be common sense. Cold iron, salt, running water. The power of a true name, the downfall of the arrogant. Reads about the old places, the mounds of untouched, wild earth, and the fairy circles.

A little after noon he starts working. An old, heavy chain works just fine for what he wants to do.

By sunset he has a set of heavy iron bracelets. Crude and ugly but they fit easily on his wrists. He’s agreed to let this faerie take him, but he refuses to be helpless.

He supposes there should be some sort of despair. Looking out over the city as the setting sun pulls back the curtain of light. The real city is always hidden beneath. The real Gotham is cool shadows, dim streetlights. The glittering points of thousands of lives picked out in red and yellow, taillights and windows and noisy clubs. The cherry blur of a cigarette, the silvery flash of a knife. All in their places.

He hates it here. He loves how much he hates it here. He doesn’t think he’ll miss it.

Even before the sound there’s a smell. Like charcoal dust and burning pines. Like copper.

It’s time.

  


He almost doesn’t recognize the Faerie. Still tall and thin, but it— _they_ , he remembers—they have the usual number of eyes and their hands, while still spidery, lack claws. The nails are black, still, but Eddie supposes they are allowed to have a sense of style. He wasn’t expecting the freckles coating their pale face.

“I…I was expecting…”

“You were expecting a monster. And here I stand, a wolf at your door in a well-fitted human suit.” They say, smirking. “I could hardly swoop in and abduct you, what would your neighbors think?”

“You’re doing exactly that.”

“Indeed I am.” Their teeth are still razor sharp.

“They won’t care. No one does.”

“We shall see.”

They offer their arm. He doesn’t take it.

“Where are we going?”

“Surely you remember.”

He turns the sunstone over and over in his hands, hidden in his front pocket.

“I know where you’re taking me. I guess my question is, how are we getting there?”

The Faerie leads him out into the parking lot.

“You’re familiar with liminal spaces, yes?”

“Our brains think there’s something wrong because we only see those places in their usual context. Like a school at night.”

“You’re almost right. Every place has a purpose. Many purposes.”

“Like a portal to your world.”

The Faerie inclines their head just slightly. Each shadow they cast is different.

“More or less.”

It’s slow. It’s not like a portal at all, Eddie realizes. It’s more like wading into the sea, where the shore is his world and the water is theirs. Little things change. The streetlights shift in color from dingy yellow and coral-orange to white, to blue, to nothing at all but ambiance. There are trees between the phone poles and then they are all trees. The stars slowly change. The air smells different.

“What should I call you,” Eddie asks. They’re deep in the woods now. The farther they go, the deeper into autumn they seem to go. Dark trees giving way to brilliant orange and red.

“I have a lot of names,” the Faerie says. “I doubt you could pronounce them.”

“Give me one?”

“If you give me yours.” The Faerie’s pale eyes glitter in the starlight. Sinister, mocking, but playful. Still giving Eddie something in exchange.

“...Edward.”

It’s not his True name, he figures. The name he calls himself is his True one. He holds that close to his chest.

“You may call me Scarecrow. I heard you say it before. _Is that still what they call me?_ ”

“Yeah, they still call you that in the little towns. The old, old men.”

The Faerie is changing, too, Eddie realizes. Their voice shifts back into that almost nauseating sensory barrage, as much a feeling on his skin as in his ears. As though his human mind can’t process it fully as sound. The edges of their clothing fade, shifting until there are no edges at all, transitioning seamlessly into skin, and then into dark feathers. Their fingers get longer, darker at the ends, and the gentle billow of their scarf becomes smoke and shadow.

And it gets cold. So cold. The still air seems to press in from all sides. Realistically, he knows that heat is moving out from his body, that energy moves along certain paths, but it feels like the cold is sinking into him layer by layer. Only the warm stone in his hands keeps its heat. Grounds him as he steps over fallen branches and wades through brilliant red leaves, keeps him from dissolving into cold, cold atoms.

“ _Not far,_ ” the Faerie says. Eddie’s teeth are chattering too much to reply, and he can feel the smell of that voice at the back of his throat. 

He almost trips over a stone brick. There are a lot of them around, now, the odd crumbling pillar and mossy landing scattered among the fallen leaves.

“Is it,” he manages, “Is it always this cold?” 

The Faerie looks at him with their head cocked to the side like a dog. “ _Perhaps. I can’t feel it much anymore.”_

“What do you mean any--” 

They put out an arm to stop him. Close up, Eddie can see the scaly skin on their fingers, like the talons of a bird. They point.

“ _Just here._ ” 

Two dead trees have fallen against one another, forming an archway in the path. Covered in dark moss and tiny mushrooms, hung with little vines of all sorts. 

“ _Through here.”_

Eddie peers curiously at it, touching the bark, close enough to smell the deep, mellow scent of moss.

“These just happen?”

“ _Sometimes. I could simply make a doorway, of course, but the natural pathways are much gentler on humans.”_ They smirk, showing a flash of white teeth against black gums and an equally dark tongue. “ _Wouldn’t want to break you prematurely.”_

“How kind,” Eddie says dryly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter cuts off pretty abruptly, but I'm ok with that. I'd rather put this chapter out in two parts than keep sitting on it, I'm eager for input!


	7. Chapter 7

It’s breathtaking after so many years in the city.

It’s big, big as a cathedral, maybe bigger, the ceiling so high he wonders if there are ceilings at all. Crumbling stone structures have been overtaken by moss and ivy. There’s a massive tree at what Eddie thinks is the center, twisted and hung all through with lanterns that give off soft, golden-white light. Everything is misty at the edges, pleasantly dim in shades of gray and green.

“It’s beautiful here,” he says, touching the soft moss that covers what looks like a fallen stone column. He squints. Corinthian, he notes, the intricate capital depicting strange creatures he can’t quite place.

“Is this your home?”

Scarecrow sweeps past him.

“It is.”

Their voice is almost entirely sound now. It’s a huge relief on his buzzing nerves. They feel compressed, like this place contains them in a way his world can’t. Evens them out into something easier to perceive.

“It’s yours, too, for the time being.”

He turns slowly on the spot, taking everything in.

“I’m not sure what I was expecting.”

Scarecrow cocks their head at him. Like a bird, or a dog. Now that he’s really been looking, he can see both in them. In subtle ways, like the way their many eyes reflect light in the semidarkness. The look of their hair and the fur on their shoulders.

“What are you going to do to me? I’d prefer to know now, before I start to get comfortable.”

The Faerie gestures for him to follow and sets off toward the tree.

“Nothing, yet. In this state, you’re far too weak to do much of anything with.”

Eddie pulls his sleeves down a little farther over his skinny arms.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You ask a lot of questions.”

Eddie huffs. “And then you deflect them.”

As they near the roots of the enormous tree, another figure comes into view. A woman in red overalls, sitting up in the lower branches.

“You’re back!” She says, hanging upside-down to look at the pair of them. Her pigtails sway as she starts to bounce and clap excitedly. “You brought him! I forgot! I forgot it was tonight!”

She swings herself up and backflips down with the grace of an Olympic gymnast. Her feet don’t even make a sound when she lands on the cracked, crumbling flagstones. She rushes forward and hugs Scarecrow around the middle.

They hug back. Eddie’s surprised, but he supposes Fae have friends too.

“My lovely sister,” they purr. She calls them something that sounds like the snarling of wolves and the call of crows, like the wicked shrewdness in a raven’s beady eyes. It makes the hair on his neck stand on end and his nose fill with the smell of smoke and leaves.

Scarecrow is the first to break the embrace, though their bony arm remains around her shoulders.

“I don’t believe you’ve been introduced.”

“No, we haven’t,” Eddie says, and it’s not exactly a lie. He thinks he knows exactly who she is, and what she looks like as a little bird. There’s a big black diamond on the front pocket of her overalls.

They call her a name that sits like hot honey in Eddie’s ears, heavy and sweet and burning as it melts down his spine.

“Harlequin, to your kind.”

Her eyes are a little too large, too blue, her smile too toothy, her hair too blonde. Unlike her sibling, her human suit doesn’t quite fit.

He offers his hand. “Edward. A pleasure.”

“Call me Harley, sweetie, everybody does.”

She makes to shake his hand and grimaces as it shimmers like a heatwave. Eddie’s eyes water trying to look right at it.

“Ah. ‘Scuse me for a second, lemme just take this off.”

He doesn’t have time to ask what she means before she shifts seamlessly into something that looks much less artificial. She still has lots of messy blonde hair, but now it’s on more than just her head. Golden fur comes down her jaw and dusts the tops of her cheeks, her arms, the backs of her hands. Her ears drift upwards and grow big, rounded and black. Her legs shift into canine legs, golden with black spots. She grows a short tail, and her hands gain black pads. Her clothes stay the same and she doesn’t grow much, just an inch or so.

She smiles at him with a mouth full of sharp teeth and unfolds the same sparkling beetle wings she had as a hummingbird as she stretches luxuriously.

“That’s so much better.” She cocks her head. “Ya look surprised, sweetie.”

Eddie flounders to figure out how to put it, opens and closes his mouth several times. He must look like such a moron.

“I thought...I thought you two would look more alike, is all.”

“A lot of our appearance is based on our magic,” Scarecrow says from somewhere above. Eddie looks up to see them perched on the same branch she came down from. He didn’t even hear them move. “It’s not uncommon for family members to look little to nothing like one another.”

Harley does a little spin.

“You like it?”

“It’s surprising, but it looks more real. It looks natural.” He smiles a little. “It looks good.”

She giggles and hugs him with much more strength than he anticipated. His ribs groan in protest. The sunstone seems to pulse with extra warmth between them. He wonders if she can feel it.

She pulls back, hands on his shoulders, and looks at him critically.

“When’s the last time you had a good night’s sleep, sweetie? Ya look wiped.”

He doesn’t look at her. He can feel her gaze boring into him.

“Last night.”

“And before that?” She touches his face gently. Her hands are very warm. “Look at these circles. Like a raccoon.”

“Not sure,” he mumbles. He glances back up at Scarecrow nervously. He doesn’t like the idea of discussing potential weaknesses in front of them. The Faerie merely waves a hand.

“Harley, please take him to his chambers. I have business to attend to.”

Harley snaps to attention and gives an exaggerated salute. “You got it!”

Chambers? Who says that anymore?

“C’mon, sweetie,” she says, taking his hand. “You’re gonna like it here.”

The ‘chambers’ they mentioned turn out to be spacious, made of ruined stone walls and ivy-covered arches. Beautiful, with a bed of soft, dark moss covering the floor and a small pool he assumes is for bathing.

“You look a lot better than you did,” Harley says. He smiles at her. He can’t remember the last time he felt like smiling at anyone.

“I don’t know how to thank you. You helped me so much.”

She pulls a couple of soft, burgundy blankets out of her tiny, tiny pockets.

“Don’t mention it, sweetie. I’m real glad you let me in.”

She digs in her pocket and a large pillow emerges. Like a clown. Or, Eddie supposes, a harlequin.

“You’ll sleep really well here,” she says.

“Where?” There doesn’t seem to be a bed in this room.

“Over here, Ed. Can I call you Ed? I’m gonna call you Ed.”

She motions him over to a large, fallen tree and starts piling pillows and blankets inside. Jewel tones of burgundy and gold and deep blue fill the cavity in the trunk.

Now that she mentions it, it does look roomy. And he’s so exhausted, still.

“Get some sleep, sweetie. Things are gonna be pretty weird tomorrow.”

He touches her shoulder.

“Thank you. I mean it.”

“You’re welcome, Ed.”

She gives him a final hug and flutters off, presumably to join her sibling up in the tree.

Well. This is certainly better than he’d thought.

He takes off his boots, kicks off his socks and his jeans. The moss is soft underfoot.

Much better than he’d thought.

He climbs in. The walls inside are smooth and polished, the blankets soft and heavy, the pillows cool. He lies there, in the dim light, turning the sunstone over in his hands. Two, three, four times. He counts. It soothes him.

He’s asleep before he reaches twenty.

  


Harley looks at her sibling critically.

“What’s your endgame here? He’s a nice boy an’ I don’t want you to hurt him.”

They spin the surplus Curse idly through their fingers. Soft orange light dances in the leaves of their tree.

“I do not know yet. He has seen the lake, which is admittedly rare.”

That’s an understatement, and they both know it. It’s not doing them any favors trying to be casual about it.

“Seen it? He’s almost _been_ there. He was real close last time.” 

“Others have been closer. That doesn’t mean anything.”

She scratches the pad of her foot, tail twitching in irritation. 

“It’s still warm, do you know that?”

They sit up, rustling their feathers. “That’s not possible. You’re certain?”

She nods. “I felt it when I hugged him. He’s somethin’ real special. You’ve gotta feel it too.”

“I think he just might be.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For just a hint of extra content, a look into my thought processes, or to give me that sweet sweet validation, check me out on tumblr at thetruecaesar or pinterest.com/darthviye


	8. Chapter 8

The little human’s dreams rip through her senses like jagged claws. Harley approaches him slowly, softly. His face is blank in sleep, his body still, but the awful sting of his memories sours the air in her home. She hears old screams in the rustling leaves, smells the despair and desperation that hangs heavy and bitter around him. If she concentrates, she can feel his bruises ripple across her skin. Even a pale shade of his suffering is enough to prick her eyes with tears.

She crouches beside him, watches carefully while she gathers up the right sort of magic. Delicate, she must be delicate. She traces his pale cheek with the backs of her fingers, letting her soft fur begin to soothe him. It creates an opening deep in his unconscious mind, just big enough for her to nudge her way inside and smooth over the terrible dreams.

She touches one and nearly recoils at the bitter sting of betrayed trust and the awful, aching feeling of loving the hands that strike and spread purple under the skin. She knows those all too well. If she were a little more careless, she could easily slip into the sensations like a second skin. But she won’t. At one point, maybe, but the goal steadies her. Help him. All she must do his help him.

Harley can’t pull the memories out but she can round the sharp edges of his nightmares. She shapes each one smooth enough to run over like water, without catching, without dwelling there. Layers the smells and textures of soft moss and dry autumn leaves between the memories, pads them out so they don’t crash together so terribly. It won’t last long, but it should be enough for a few nights of rest.

The air already smells sweeter, lighter. The tree stops its restless blustering and settles. Lets her climb back into her hammock nest and sways her gently. Her sibling perches next to her, steady and secure.

“You did well,” they say. “Such delicate detail.”

“Poor guy deserves a break,” she says, simply. “You coulda helped.”

They rustle their feathers, forked wolf tail twitching uneasily. The shaggy canine legs they so often keep hidden are hanging free over the back of the branch they sit upon. She lets her gaze get lost in the dark fur, the way it curls in between their toes and the backs of their ankles and their knees to match their unruly hair.

“You know I could not. I have never been able to help.” They flex their black, scaly fingers, gentle light gleaming off noble talons. “I can only hurt. Nothing like you, sweet sister.”

They touch her face and she smiles, leans into their hand.

“My beautiful sister. Sometimes I envy how easily you can mend that which is broken.”

She kisses their palm, much too cool to the touch.

“Lie down with me? You feel cold.”

They nod, briefly, and she is engulfed in strong wings, soft feathers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shorter one, this time. Just something in between big chunks I've written. I haven't abandoned this!


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